thing! I am getting on in life, and I
don't want any more scenes to bring discredit on my house."

"Go and tell her that from henceforth she and her husband will dine and
sup in their own room and that I will pay for them as long as I remain
here."

"You are very generous, sir, but you know that meals in a private room
are charged double."

"I know they are."

"Very good."

I shuddered at the idea of the woman being turned out of doors without
any resources but her body, by which she refused to profit. On the other
hand I could not condemn the inn-keeper who, like his fellows, was not
troubled with much gallantry. I had yielded to an impulse of pity without
any hopes of advantage for myself. Such were my thoughts when Stuard came
to thank me, begging me to come and see his wife and try and persuade her
to behave in a different manner.

"She will give me no answers, and you know that that sort of thing is
rather tedious."

"Come, she knows what you have done for her; she will talk to you, for
her feelings . . . ."

"What business have you to talk about feelings after what happened
yesterday evening?"

"It was well for that gentleman that he went away at midnight, otherwise
I should have killed him this morning."

"My dear sir, allow me to tell you that all that is pure braggadocio.
Yesterday, not to-day, was the time to kill him, or to throw your plate
at his head, at all events. We will now go and see your wife."

I found her in bed, her face to the wall, the coverlet right up to her
chin, and her body convulsed with sobs. I tried to bring her to reason,
but as usual got no reply. Stuard wanted to leave me, but I told him that
if he went out I would go too, as I could do nothing to console her, as
he might know after her refusing the Marquis of Grimaldi's hundred louis
for a smile and her hand to kiss.

"A hundred Louis!" cried the fellow with a sturdy oath; "what folly! We
might have been at home at Liege by now. A princess allows one to kiss
her hand for nothing, and she.... A hundred Louis! Oh, damnable!"

His exclamations, very natural under the circumstances, made me feel
inclined to laugh. The poor devil swore by all his gods, and I was about
to leave the room, when all at once the wretched woman was seized with
true or false convulsions. With one hand she seized a water-bottle and
sent it flying into the middle of the room, and with the other she tore
the clothes away from her breast. Stuard trie